Gordon Brown

Gareth, re the disgusting "toss" comment.

Sometimes I reckon on a forum you have to look at what people are trying to say, and not always the written word. People who analyse the words too much tend to try to use them as weapons, as opposed to forwarding a constructive arguement based on what people are actually trying to say.

Of course I take note, I just do not see the relevance of where we are now. Perhaps i'm showing my age but the same way I do not hold Thatchers governance against David Cameron, is the same way I will not hold any future labour leaders government accountable in 20 years time for what Blair and Brown did. Different people, different times, probably with different policies.

I'm interested in local isses (in the real world) and how to improve them, I leave the big stuff to the educated folk. If I thought for a minute Labour knew what they were talking about on a local level, I might actually take them seriously nationally. I think the truth is sadly they haven't a clue on anything anymore. Power went to their heads.
 
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Warbler said:
I note that in the finest traditions of eurocratic diagnosis you seek the 'less contentious' approach, rather than perhaps lookign for the most effective and appropriate which would be to throw 'Lisbon' into a brazier
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The approach I mention has already been adopted in Ireland quite successfully. It emerged from structured social dialogue between government, trade unions and employers. Site inspections, especially in the agricultural and construction sectors were beefed up. Extra inspectors were recruited and efforts made to properly enforce legislation. The immigrant workers are protected from exploitation and the local workers and employers are not undercut, at least not illegally.

And yes, if the European social democrat/christian democrat tradition stands for anything meaningful it is social inclusion and dialogue. Since it started moving away from the British model and copying some of the continental models Ireland has enjoyed greater industrial peace, greater flexibility to respond to economic change, and better protection for the least well off. The series of tripartite National Understandings between the social partners are a big part of the explanation for economic growth in Ireland.

In the UK increased 'flexibility' came about by crushing the trade unions, which now can do little more than sell insurance and cheap holidays.

By the way, free movement of labour already exists, or will soon exist, throughout the EU. This is part and parcel of the single market rather than being linked to the Lisbon Treaty.
 
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With free movement of labour should come standardised or centrally controlled employment law(to include minimum wage, H&S, the whole shebang), income tax, social welfare and non-EU immigration. Without this, there becomes a system of subsidies and penalties existing more through lack of flexibilty than actual market needs.
 
Its not necesserily the minimum wagers that are the issue here. It is the semi skilled and skilled manual (and increasingly office workers) that are/were being undercut. they are the ones who are having incomes driven down and security decreased.

You have to have free movement within the EU. Thats a basic but it was slightly questionable to me to bring on board countries with huge labour forces that could and would work for substantially less. Fair play to the Poles and so on. They have made a great job of it and as a beliver in the free market i am not 100% against all this...but its very easy to see why people are...
 
Flexibility for who?

Employers to stick workers on contracts and offer ever less protection by way of job security. It also allows them to introduce periodic wage cuts through the back door in the rgeion of between 10% to 20% which is all to apparent in todays market. The growth of the 'fixed term contract' stifles continuity and people (like myself) get trapped on them with the result that we can't borrow money and are basically there to be fleeced by the needs of capital. Words like flexibility are bandied about as if its some kind of desirable output. Where I'm sitting on the sharp edge of it, it doesn't look particularly desirable at all. NAFTA have been trying to do something similar with Mexico, and more recently Japan in China.

The EU's response has been internalise this instability by telling us we're a trading bloc (whatever one of those are) and drum into us that we need to be more flexible, which as I said is a by word for lower wage pressures and greater insecurity, with ever more marginal terms and conditions. The system works for capital and makes the odd social concession to labour by way of a classic revisionist stance, such as a 'working time directive'. As with any revisionism carried out under the name social chauvinism its effectiveness has to be judged in its implementation, and not its cosmetic appearance in 1001 documents and policy papers. Since this responsibility remains in the hands of bourgeouis capitalist ruling class elite, a conflict of interest is built into the system that will only ensure partial role out, and reproduction through sustaining the status quo that no one who benefits from it is going to question. In effect those who might be in a position to reform it, benefit most from it and thus have the least incentive to take a critical view. The capitalist and the bourgeois bureaucracy have a cosy mutual self dependency and co-existance

I think it's important to recognise too that the EU today (courteousy of Lisbon) looks nothing like it did when Maastricht was ratified. In 1992 we had a much greater harmoney between the western European economies, which didn't permit Eastern European workers to head west and squeeze labour costs. The other issue of course concerns the introduction of non-EU nationals who once they've found a way of getting inside through a point of leaky entry start to cherry pick their location and bring about local pressures.

The original BeNeLux concept might have been established with the view reduce the prospect a major European war through increased dialogue but that raison d'etre has largely (though not completely) been made redundant through weapon technologies anyway.

There is of course a decadent and criminally corrupt core within the self-serving European bureaucracy and well fuelled gravy chain allowing a nouveau elite to feed off it, as well as sustain it uncritically.
 
Flexibility for who?
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For every Irish worker and tax payer.

Social dialogue has made it possible for trade unions to be more flexible about wage demands because they recognise that what matters to their members is take home pay, social benefits and the quality of government services rather than simply their gross income. This allows for a trade off between government, employers and unions whereby changes to the tax, social welfare and child care systems can be taken into account in pay negotiations.

As a result during the period of the National Understandings lower paid workers have received higher increases than the rest, and social welfare payments to the least well off have greatly improved. As far as I'm aware unemployment assistance for a single person in Ireland living on their own is about double what it is in the UK, even after differences in the cost of living are taken into account.

I'm not saying it is a panacea, but through the National Understanding process Irish trade unions, and consequently Irish workers, have more influence over their fate than their counterparts in the UK. And, unlike in the old adversarial model of industrial relations, trade unions are seen to care about the unemployed and pensioners and not just the purely sectional interests of their own members.

Anyone interested in knowing more might like to have a look at this article from the Dublin Review of Books:

http://www.drb.ie/more_details/08-09-25/lifting_the_boats.aspx
 
Its not necesserily the minimum wagers that are the issue here. It is the semi skilled and skilled manual (and increasingly office workers) that are/were being undercut. they are the ones who are having incomes driven down and security decreased.
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The minimum wagers are often a big part of it, though, and the undercutting in other sectors is often the result of people working outside the tax system.
 
You havent understood my point Grey. The tax issue is irrelevant. Thats aways happened and frankly the scope in many sectors to work "outside tax" is very limited

Iit is very easy to apprecaite that those on average and slightly lower incomes resent being undercut and unsettled by eastern european labour..
 
Sorry if I've misunderstood your point. I'm not sure I do now.

Won't an employer or self employed person who is not paying VAT, tax and social insurance contributions find it easier to undercut a competitor that is doing things by the book? This is unfair competition which can be addressed by proper enforcement of the law.

Immigrants often find it easier to get work in the black economy than in the formal economy and some of the resentment towards them is related to unfair competition more than anything else. So why is taking action to deal with it irrelevant?
 
I'm sorry Grey, but i think you're miles off beam, and probably to far divorced from the chalk face to know what's happening on the ground.

What Clive's talking about is the Eastern European worker who can be employed for 50% less which is having two affects (more in truth).

Their input is driving down the cost of UK labour, and introducing ever greater insecurity (Brussels speak is to call it flexibility) into the workforce. There is not a snow ball in hells chance that anyone seeking to gain a commercial advantage will be prosecuted to any level of numbers for it to act as a deterrant, because the authorities don't want to do it and have no incentive to either.

Any idea how long that would take to prosecute?

And in any event, all the evidence I've seen suggests that the transgressor simply liquidates one company and then pulls another off the shelf to operate under. It's called flexibility. For Brussels to say its a regulatory thing is just a cop out. The EU created this mess, and we were denied a vote on it (but then there's never been anything democratic about the EU anyway). If you seriously think that enforecement is the answer then I'm even more concerned for the airy fairy ideas coming out of Brussels. The system has been designed to be non-punitive, protracted and unenforceable

It is fine for a jobbing tourist to take work (anitpodeans have been doing it for years). What we're seeing courteousy of Europe is an influx of Eastern Europeans renting out properties in multiple occupation, sharing that rent and then taking British jobs at a level slightly better paid than Eastern European. They might very well return to Eastern Europe after a few years and take their income with them as they are essentially saving rather than spending whilst here. They are however replaced by the next wave, so what you get is churn rather than a temporary phenonemon. The individuals might alter with time, but the pressure remains in the economy, hence why I call it a corrupt cosy club designed for the interests of capital to squeeze labour

Thanks for your flexibility, it might look good on a balance sheet but it does feck all for those of us who're suffering because of it
 
Warbler,

I am not "Brussels". I am speaking here in a personal capacity and talking mainly about Irish experience.

The UK, Sweden and Ireland opened their borders to labour from the new Member States ten years ahead of the rest of EU-15. The decision was in each case a national one. The remaining EU states opted to hold off on this during a transitional period and about half of them will continue to apply restrcitions until 2011. Therefore it is not correct to say that in the UK "the EU created this mess". And by the way, which Member State do you suppose pushed for free movement of labour in the EU more than any other?

The term 'flexibility' as used by me has nothing to do with liberal management speak for denying employees their rights. I was talking about collective negotiations covering the full range of socio-economic issues. Tackling different aspects of the big picture simultaneously allows sacrifices in one area, e.g. pay, to be set off against gains in others, e.g. free child care or lower taxes. In this way the social partners can be more flexible than the more traditional setting of negotiations purely about pay.

Regarding enforcement, nobody accused the Irish trade unions of being airy-fairy when they placed great emphasis on it:

... in 2005-06 the drafting of the National Development Plan for the 2008-13 period was repeatedly postponed as the outcome of negotiations between the social partners on Towards 2016 was awaited. Significantly, the hold-up was caused by SIPTU (the largest trade union in Ireland), led by its very effective general president Jack O’Connor, who refused to sign up until a comprehensive strengthening of the state labour inspectorate was put in place to ensure employer compliance with labour law, especially in the areas of minimum wage and health and safety, and focusing on preventing the exploitation of immigrant labour or using it to undermine the pay and conditions of workers generally. The agreement was ultimately ratified after intense debate by a 74 per cent majority of trade union delegates, with even traditional opponents of the deal “without exception pleased with the employment standards measures” achieved
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Warbler said:
What we're seeing courteousy of Europe is an influx of Eastern Europeans renting out properties in multiple occupation, sharing that rent and then taking British jobs at a level slightly better paid than Eastern European. They might very well return to Eastern Europe after a few years and take their income with them as they are essentially saving rather than spending whilst here. They are however replaced by the next wave, so what you get is churn rather than a temporary phenonemon. The individuals might alter with time, but the pressure remains in the economy, hence why I call it a corrupt cosy club designed for the interests of capital to squeeze labour
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I seem to remember very similar arguments being voiced when I started work 40 years ago, but the subjects were Commonwealth citizens then. This was in the days when General de Gaulle kept on saying "Non".
At that time I was not affected as I did an engineering apprenticeship, and, for a few years after finishing my time, I could find a job fairly easily. Once TBW decided to kill off most of our manufacturing industry it got harder and harder to find any job at all, let alone make a career out of it. Manufaturing never recovered from the short recession of the early 90's really.
For the past 7 years I have been working as a so called building services technician, or glorified janitor. It's a complete waste of my skills and experience it's also bloody frustrating having to work with some outright dummies, but I have little choice.
 
walsworth said:
I seem to remember very similar arguments being voiced when I started work 40 years ago, but the subjects were Commonwealth citizens then. This was in the days when General de Gaulle kept on saying "Non".
At that time I was not affected as I did an engineering apprenticeship, and, for a few years after finishing my time, I could find a job fairly easily. Once TBW decided to kill off most of our manufacturing industry it got harder and harder to find any job at all, let alone make a career out of it. Manufaturing never recovered from the short recession of the early 90's really.
For the past 7 years I have been working as a so called building services technician, or glorified janitor. It's a complete waste of my skills and experience it's also bloody frustrating having to work with some outright dummies, but I have little choice.
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TBW- That Bloody Woman ? :)
 
Grey said:
Sorry if I've misunderstood your point. I'm not sure I do now.

Won't an employer or self employed person who is not paying VAT, tax and social insurance contributions find it easier to undercut a competitor that is doing things by the book? This is unfair competition which can be addressed by proper enforcement of the law.

Immigrants often find it easier to get work in the black economy than in the formal economy and some of the resentment towards them is related to unfair competition more than anything else. So why is taking action to deal with it irrelevant?
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No coz he has to pay it and he can't claim it back.
The wages in the so called black economy are to low to live on and maintain standards, why should we have our living standards lowerd.
You can't take action if you don't no the size of the problem bamg goes your cheap take-away your curry your drive way you will pay more for less.:cool:What's the point of that it drive people into crime not out of it.:mad:
 
Ardross said:
Her behaviour is contemptible - though Hazel Blears tops it and she should watch out - the general opinion in the Labour Party up here is that she has behaved abominably - I would not be surprised to see her deselected -
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:lol:

Oh how humble she is all of sudden. Perhaps a badge that reads 'capsizing my boat' might have been more appropriate? Or even 'rowing the boat back' (as desparately as I can) since my putsch has failed and now, and I'm on the verge of getting a little bit closer to my community then I had anticipated:lol: yeah... as a voter Hazel. As excuses go, it's a pretty poor one isn't it.

"I was under a pressure for month" - for crying out loud, you're supposed to be a minister for state and paid to handle high pressure environments and demonstrate sound judgement and cool etc and not buckle the first time the Daily Telegraph puts you under pressure. She rolled the dice and lost, would she have regretted her actions if Brown had gone? I doubt it.
 
Saturday, June 13, 2009Building firm in row over subcontractors

PAUL CULLENA DECISION by leading construction firm P Elliott to lay off up to 25 bricklayers has re-ignited a row over the use of subcontractors in place of directly employed labour.
The company says it laid off the workers because it has no work for them but the workers claim this is not the case and they are being replaced by subcontractors.
The Building and Allied Trades Union (Batu) said it didn’t accept the company’s explanation that the redundancies were due to the economic downturn.
Assistant general secretary Brendan O’Sullivan said the company had work requiring bricklayers in the Republic, Northern Ireland and Britain and there was evidence that it was using subcontractors to carry it out.
An agreement banning the use of subcontracted labour in Dublin ran out last year.
The dispute is set for hearing at the Construction Industry Disputes Tribunal, a division of the Labour Court, later this month....
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It might be interesting to see how this unfolds.
 
Sorry slightly off the flow of the subject , but did any one see Bremner, Bird and Fortune last night and the song at the end where 'GB' sang Fantine's song from Les Miserables? Absolutely brilliant.
 
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